Legally Blonde Opening Sequence

An opening sequence is the first part of your film that the audience see. It should captivate the audience and make them want to watch onto the rest of the movie. An opening sequence should set up the location and time, introduce the audience to the main character(s), contain music that is relevant to the film, set up the genre and future themes of the film, contain a few important credits, introduce the storyline, establish the key iconography, and set the pace of the film. If an opening sequence does all this it is highly successful, however it does not always have to contain all of these aspects for it to be a good opening sequence.
The 2001 film 'Legally Blonde' has an opening sequence that engages the audience and allows us an insider into the life of the main character. It is a fairly short sequence but in that space of time it manages to tell us a lot about the main character, the location and the general mood of the film. It sets it up to be a chick flick from the very beginning and introduces us to the storyline therefore living up to the audiences expectations and making them want to watch on.

The music is very happy and jolly and anchors what is going on on the screen. The lyrics 'Its a perfect day' are shown by the sunny sky, beautiful people and the main character getting ready for her boyfriend. It is emphasised by the use of high key lighting which makes everything seem far more perfect than it may be. The audience immediately know that the 'perfect day' is related to what is going to happen with the main character and her boyfriend as that is what the entire opening is leading up to, as that is what the card she is given is for.
The whole opening sequence is following the card that is being delivered to the main charcter. This is how we find out that the main character's name is 'Elle' as it is written on the envelope. The card starts off in the basket off a bike with a girl riding it through the town. The camera passes by many serorities and we get the feel of a typical American teenage community that is friendly and perfect. The bike rides into a serority called 'Delta Nu' and we know from this that the main character must belong to this serority. The camera then cuts to show Elle's dressing table with a mirror on it saying 'President'. The audience link the two and assume that she must be the president of the Delta Nu serority and therefore must be important and loved. We then follow the card through the serority showing all the good looking girls doing their makeup after showering and keeping fit. It is what the audience would expect to see from a very girlie serority and therefore it sets the scene up and lets the audience know that it is going to be an extremely feminie film.
There are many shots of Elle's belongings telling us a lot about the character just from what she owns and what the camera is showing her doing. We do not see her face until the very end of the opening sequence, however, from all the shots before this we can guess she is going to be a very made-up, stunning, blonde girl. This is because there are many establishing shots of her things such as nail varnish bottles, herbal essesnces hair dye, fluffy pens, glittery picture frames, fashion magazines, pink shoes, heart jewelry, Prada shopping bags etc. These shots all connote different things to the audience but the main thing it tells us about Elle is that she is the stereotypical blonde girly girl. The shopping bags tell the audience that she is a big fan of shopping and the fact that they are Prada tell us that she is wealthy and likes to shop designer wear. The nail varnish and various make-up products placed on her dressing table show that she is a very self-indulged character and she cares a lot about the way she looks. She obviously likes to be well groomed and this is anchored by the fact that in many of the shots of her she is indulging in her beauty regime which involves shaving her legs, painting her perfect nails and brushing her hair. There is a close up shot of a sash in her room saying 'Homecoming Queen'. This signals to the audience that she was homecoming queen at high school and therefore must be very popular. The picture frames on her desk show pictures of a chihuahua dog dressed in clothes. We can assume that this is her dog otherwise it would not be in a picture frame on her desk. It is something that a typical American blonde such as Paris Hilton would do with their dog and shows that she maybe aspires to be like that. It shows she is extremely girly and also loves her animals.
The first shot is a CU of her blonde hair swishing which immediatly ties in the tital of 'Legally Blonde'. It is an effective opening shot because it introduces the important part of the main character and therefore the storyline without giving anything else away. It is eye-catching and different and as it is the first shot the audience know that the blonde hair plays a big part in the role of this film.
Towards the end of the opening sequence you hear the main character talking on her phone and then see her opening her card and blowing a kiss to the picture of her boyfriend. The audience can assume that she is gossiping from what she is saying which is a very sterotypical girly thing and her tone of voice and actions show that she is ditzy and feminine, very much like what we would have expected to see leading up to it. The way she blows her boyfriend's picture a kiss shows that she cares a lot about him but also shows the audience that she is still young at heart as not many adults would do this. It therefore shows she is innocent and some what naive, setting us up for what is to come.
When Elle opens the card the audience get an insight into what all the fuss is about. We find out that Elle is getting ready to go out with her boyfriend, Warner, and so therefore something big must be about to happen. However the audience get the impression that everything is too good and perfect to be true and we can foresee something bad that will happen on this date.
The font used for the credits is pink and swirly, with hearts as dots for the 'i''s and very calligraphic joined up lettering. This emphasises the fact that the movie is very feminine and girly. It almost looks as if the writing of an American girl next door and therefore the audience can link this writing with the main character, Elle, and therefore anchor the fact that she is very fun, bubbly and a typical girl.

The audience find out all these elements from the way the opening sequence is shot and put together. Without it the story would be far more confusing as we would have never had the establishing shots introducing us to various things and giving us some background information, we would have just been thrown straight into the story and made to guess what was happening. This is why opening sequences are so important as they set up what the film is going to be for the audience and lets them know what is to come.